"The FBI is investigating whether a top Russian banker with ties to the Kremlin illegally funneled money to the National Rifle Association to help Donald Trump win the presidency, two sources familiar with the matter have told McClatchy...

So, the uber-patriotic NRA was in bed with the Russians to elect Lying Donnie Dotard? It'll be fun to watch Wayne LaPierre join Jared, Junior, and the rest of the Trump crime family in their perp walk.

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As long as the roots are not severed, all will be well in the garden.

Yet the moron in chief and his enablers refuse to admit what is more and more evident every day. Yes, morons, the Russians corrupted the election. Almost certainly enough that Donny’s election was illegitimate, when combined with the Comey email nonsense.

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"In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act." -
George Orwell

WASHINGTON — President Trump ordered the firing last June of Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel overseeing the Russia investigation, according to four people told of the matter, but ultimately backed down after the White House counsel threatened to resign rather than carry out the directive.

How we really really knew the Russians did it: the intel services didn't just have smoking guns, they had real-time tracking of the bullets in flight! Fascinating reporting from the Dutch, whose intel guys handed it all to us, wrapped up with a pretty pink bow:

Shep Smith of Fox News blasts Republicans and his own network for provided bogus cover for their Dear Leader

Fox News anchor Shepard Smith rebuked Republicans in Congress and some at his own network for hyping the release of a memo reportedly detailing surveillance abuses by the U.S. government, calling the memo a "weapon of mass distraction" on his show Thursday.

"Many who've seen the memo say it's misleading, distracting and lacking context," Smith said. "The memo itself is in the conservative discussion mix while the special counsel investigating Russian interference into our democracy is apparently about to interview the president of the United States while seeking to determine whether he's colluded with the Russians or obstructed justice."

"A memo can be a weapon of partisan mass distraction," he added. "Especially at a pivotal moment in American democracy when it behooves the man in charge for supporters to believe the institutions can't be trusted, the investigators are corrupt and the news media are liars. Context matters."

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As long as the roots are not severed, all will be well in the garden.

President Donald Trump pressed senior aides last June to devise and carry out a campaign to discredit senior FBI officials after learning that those specific employees were likely to be witnesses against him as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, according to two people directly familiar with the matter...

The FBI officials Trump has targeted are Andrew McCabe, the current deputy FBI director and who was briefly acting FBI director after Comey’s firing; Jim Rybicki, Comey’s chief of staff and senior counselor; and James Baker, formerly the FBI’s general counsel. Those same three officials were first identified as possible corroborating witnesses for Comey in a June 7 article in Vox.

"So long as President Trump continues disgracing the Oval Office, thoughtful people will probe their own role in helping him get there.

Such appeared to be the motivation behind a mea culpa issued by CNN senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin on comedian Larry Wilmore’s “Black on the Air” podcast. In a discussion of presidential politics, Wilmore argued that Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee in 2016, was the victim of a “coordinated attack” coming from Republicans. “Benghazi was … the expression of that attack. In fact, what’s his name, was it [former Rep. Jason] Chaffetz who actually kind of agreed that that’s what they were doing, was weakening her as a candidate.” (Wilmore may have been referring to Rep. Kevin McCarthy, who said in 2015, ““Everybody thought Hillary Clinton was unbeatable, right? But we put together a Benghazi special committee, a select committee. What are her numbers today? Her numbers are dropping.”)

No question about the attack on Clinton, responded Toobin, citing “all that bogus stuff about the Clinton Foundation” — perhaps a reference to the Uranium One story or even to the pre-election reporting of Bret Baier — later withdrawn — that there would be an indictment relating to the foundation.

“And I hold myself somewhat responsible for that,” continued Toobin, a steady presence on CNN since 2002. “I think there was a lot of false equivalence in the 2016 campaign. That every time we said something, pointed out something about Donald Trump — whether it was his business interests, or grab ’em by the p–––y, we felt like, ‘Oh, we gotta, like, talk about — we gotta say something bad about Hillary.’ And I think it led to a sense of false equivalence that was misleading, and I regret my role in doing that.”" WP